Thursday, 20 February 2014

The majority shareholder in Shirika la Usafiri Dar es Salaam (UDA), Simons Group will buy 20 modern buses and dispatch them on upcountry routes, the company announced recently.

Chief executive officer and chairman, Robert Kisena said in Dar es Salaam earlier this week that the buses will travel between Dar es Salaam and Mwanza, Mbeya and Tanga.
“We have already ordered 20 buses which will arrive in the country anytime in the next few weeks….we want to make travelling in the country more a comfortable undertaking,” he said. The plan goes alongside that of building hotels that offer world-class services in all the destinations where the company’s buses will be travelling to.

The fishing sector faces a number of problems, most of them self inflicted. Overfishing and illegal fishing are the order of the day in the Lake Zone.

Worse still, unscrupulous surveillance officials are directly or indirectly involved in fishing using small-mesh nets, which poses a big threat to the Nile Perch.

In one of his recent audit reports, Controller and Auditor General Ludovick Utouh noted that the amount of immature Nile Perch caught rose from 83,157 tonnes in 2008 to 84,782 tonnes in 2010 in Mwanza, Mara and Kagera regions.

Recent data published by the Tanzania Industrial Fishing and Processors Association indicates that though the Lake Victoria Fisheries Organisation wants a maximum biomass of 382,500 tons to remain in the Tanzania section of the lake, Nile Perch fishing overshot the limit by 57 per cent in 2012.

Wednesday, 19 February 2014

Transport in Mwanza city was yesterday paralysed when commuter bus operators halted services in protest against dangerous parking at Buzuruga Bus Stand.

The boycott, which began early yesterday, also affected other businesses and in some areas angry touts stoned some minibuses that defied the boycott order.

The operators told The Citizen that they were protesting against the city council move to force their vehicles to park at the newly constructed bus stand, which they claimed, is too narrow and dangerously placed.

Tuesday, 11 February 2014

Mwanza. Various opportunities in mining, fisheries, farming and tourism sectors are expected to dominate the agenda during this year’s Lake Zone investors’ forum, which Presidents Jakaya Kikwete is expected to officially open in Mwanza next week.

The three-day forum has drawn government officials, business communities and industrialists from six regions besides delegates from the East African Community member states, according to a pre-forum meeting statement released at the weekend by the Mwanza Regional Commissioner, Mr Evarist Ndikilo.

Tuesday, 4 February 2014

Misery continues to pile up at Mwanza City Council after the Parliamentary Local Authority Accounts Committee (Laac) rejected the council’s financial report on the construction of a new maternal health clinic in Nyamagana District.

The committee refused to endorse the report, saying the Sh853.5 million facility was far below standards.

Speaking to the city council’s executives, Laac chairman, Dr Hamisi Kigwangala, said the standard of the work doesn’t convince the committee that it’s worth the amount as the report presented by Halipha Hida, the Mwanza City Council executive director shows.

Police authorities in Mwanza are planning to take legal measures against an officer in Sengerema District for allegedly demanding Sh100,000 from a family of a suicide victim.

It was alleged that the officer attached to Nyakalilo Police Post in Sengerema, who was accompanied by a local militiaman, demanded the money from the family of Suzana James, 28, who hanged herself, saying the amount was for footing the cost of fuel to transport the body to hospital.

The acting regional police commander, Mr Joseph Konyo, told The Citizen that conduct of the officer was contrary to police regulations; hence he deserves a punishment. ‘’We are investigating the incident and if proved legal measures will be taken against him,” Mr Konyo said.

Monday, 3 February 2014

Mwanza. Dwindling fish population in Lake Victoria, which has dropped by about 30 per cent, has continued to pile miseries in sales of processed fish fillet from 44,423 tonnes in 2012 to 42,827 tonnes at the end of 2013.

A report on economic performance for the Lake Zone’s major produce released by an economist with the Bank of Tanzania (BoT), Mr Musa Mziya, shows that an 11 per cent drop in revenue garnered from processed fish fillet was mostly attributed to the dwindling fish population in Lake Victoria as well as illegal fishing practices and environmental degradation.

Data from the zone’s fish processing firms shows that they reaped Sh200.3 million in 2011/2012 when a kilo of fish fillet was sold at Sh4,500.

“The price increased due to the market demand, implicated by an acute shortage of fish in various areas across the zone,” he said.